Overview
- Natural History Museum researchers published a peer‑reviewed paper in Palaeontology on Wednesday that identifies the specimen as Praearcturus gigas and names it the largest known scorpion at about one metre long.
- The team used X‑ray tomography and comparisons with better‑preserved Devonian fossils to reveal scorpion‑specific anatomy, including large pincers with fixed and movable fingers, a stridulatory surface, and a scorpion‑like sternum.
- Fossils assigned to Praearcturus come from multiple Early Devonian sites in England and Wales, indicating the species had a British distribution in shallow floodplain and freshwater settings.
- Authors infer the animal may have been at least partially aquatic and an apex predator because of its size, pincer form, and flap‑like abdominal structures, while noting that lifestyle conclusions remain interpretive rather than directly observed.
- The reclassification highlights the scientific value of long‑held museum collections and modern imaging, and it prompts rethinking of why arthropods grew so large before forests and high atmospheric oxygen levels emerged.